View: Whichever way you cut it, the economy’s booming and is a welcome gift for the incoming government
JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon was responding to a question posed at the Economic Club of New York in late April on the resilience of the US economy. But he could as well have been talking of India. National Statistics Office (NSO) data released last Friday show the Indian economy is, well, booming.
At 8.2%, GDP growth for 2023-24 is streets ahead of the most optimistic estimates, and far, far ahead of RBI's estimate of 7% till as late as December 2023. Sure, there could be distortions due to the way the GDP deflator is computed, as this is then used to arrive at the real (from nominal) GDP numbers, and also because of changes in the 'net taxes' figure — GDP is GVA (gross value added) plus taxes less subsidies. But whichever way you dice the numbers — nominal or real GDP growth, GDP or GVA — there's no getting away from the fact that the Indian economy is shining.
The news has, of course, been greeted with 'ra-ras' from the ruling BJP and nitpicking by the Opposition, even as it has left the aam janta cold. This is for two reasons.
At best of times, NSO's quarterly releases on GDP — and opinion columns parsing them — don't grab too many eyeballs, as Oped writers well know. But when these estimates come just a day after the last day of campaigning for Lok Sabha elections, and a day before the last day of polls, nothing the NSO pulls out of its hat can possibly compete for attention with the cacophony of exit polls and suspense of waiting for the results now a day away.
After all, the outcome of elections will have a
